Friday, October 25, 2013

Vampire Diaries: A Chat with the Authors of Love You to Death

As many
of you know, it’s been a long
road for me to appreciating The
Vampire Diaries, and while my heart will always belong to Spike and Angel,
in the past year it’s definitely found room for both Stefan and Damon as well.
Mostly Damon.

About
nine years ago, a new girl started working at ECW Press — my publisher and the
house where I was an in-house acquisitions editor for 15 years, and am
currently still freelancing for. Immediately we began talking about Buffy, and later Friday Night Lights, dinosaur comics, The Office, Arrested
Development, and everything else pop culture. When the Buffy comics were first released, we’d both rush across the street
each month to the comic book store, where the guy had reserved copies for the
two of us, then we’d rush back, open them up and sit side by side gasping and
freaking out about each page. She read all my books and talked them up to
others, and I knew she was a very talented writer herself, so I kept bugging
her to write a book. And eventually, she did, putting together an excellent
companion guide to Gossip Girl. The
following year, we discussed other options, and landed on The Vampire Diaries, and she struck out on her own and wrote three
volumes of the companion guides, entitled Love
You To Death, one for each season (you can find them here: Season
1, Season
2, and Season
3). And they’re astoundingly
good.

Somewhere
in there she met Vee, co-administrator of Vampire-Diaries.net, and began doing
recaps on the site (which series regulars — and series creator Julie Plec
— saw and began commenting on) and for the Season
4 instalment of the book, Crissy joined forces with Vee.

This
week I had the opportunity to talk with these lovely gals about TVD, spinoff The Originals, the book series, and which Salvatore is their
favourite.

Crissy and Vee at the Gilbert mansion. Before it... well, you know.

Nikki: As Crissy knows, I was late to
the TVD party, but once I announced I had arrived, many TVD fans
seemed to want to know the answer to only one question, so I'll pose it to you:
Team Damon or Team Stefan, and why?

Crissy (@crissycalhoun): Team Salvatore! I'm a flip
flopper when it comes to romance: whoever the writers want me to like with
Elena, I do. While there have been some epically romantic moments in the
series, I don't watch for the love triangle. I watch for the utter insanity,
heartbreaking plot twists, and general amazing production values.

Vee (@dieslaughing): I'm going to have to echo Crissy
and say I am, and will always be, Team Salvatore. And that has nothing to do
with Elena, but the relationship of these two brothers. I'm not a 'shipper; I
am very much someone who is focused on character and plot, not romance. Not
that I don't appreciate that element, but if it's all I focused on, I'd be
incredibly bored most of the time.

Nikki: I’m so glad you both said that.
I’m not a shipper either, and frankly I’ve tired of the Spike vs Angel/Jack vs
Sawyer questions I get all the time, but I figured if I didn’t get that out of
way it would just be hanging over us. And we have better things to move on to.
Like… Klaus or Elijah? OK, kidding… kidding. (But seriously, it’s Klaus, right?
RIGHT?)

Ahem. I’m
pretty sure both of you were watching the show from the first night the first
episode aired — when did you know that this was the show you wanted to write
about? What was it about TVD that
appealed to you?

Crissy: Well, I came to the series not
having read the L.J. Smith books from the early '90s that it was adapted from.
So I was drawn because (a) Kevin Williamson and (b) Boone lives! But quite
early on what punched me in the gut about the show was how it was mixing this
supernatural insanity, comedic touches, romance, and this really heartbreaking
story of grief and isolation, centered on Elena Gilbert, recently orphaned, but
it extended to the supporting characters as well. It struck a chord with a
friend of mine who was going through something incredibly difficult, and that
sort of showed me that you could watch this show just for the fun of it (and
there's a ton of fun), or you could dig a little deeper and unpack what's going
on beneath all that handsomeness and shirtlessness. That question of "Is
there enough going on in this show to write a whole book on it?" is a
tricky one until you get into it, but the answer turned out to be Yes, yes,
a thousand times yes.

Vee: Well, my history with the TVD book series goes back two decades; I
read the series when it was originally released in 1991/1992. So the site I
co-own (with Red, a longtime LJS fandom leader and one of my oldest and dearest
friends), Vampire-Diaries.net, has
been covering the show since the pilot was announced in early 2009, first from
the perspective of book fans worrying over the TV adaptation, then later as
full-fledged fans of the TV series.

The
Vampire Diaries had
a lot stacked against it from the get-go: it predates Twilight, and
there are some similarities to Twilight, but the smartest move the show
made — and fairly quickly — was to place emphasis on characters and high-stakes
plotting. There are few shows that move through story as ferociously as this
one does, and they got to that point about halfway through the first season,
and it's served them well. I can't remember the last time anyone compared it to
Twilight and, trust me, that was all we heard throughout the first
season. Bucking those comparisons and going whole-hog on story and mythology is
what really made me fall in love with the show for what it is, not just because
I was a fan of the book series.

Nikki: I remember having trouble
watching TVD in the beginning because it was too Buffy-like
for me: there's a brooding vampire (Stefan/Angel), and a vampire who doesn't
care (Damon/Angelus/Spike), and a love triangle with a woman, and a best friend
who's a witch (Bonnie/Willow). Throw the werewolf stuff in there and have that
guy end up with the other best friend (Tyler/Oz) and the comparisons were
driving me nuts. AND THEN I found out the book series predated Buffy by
about five years. D'oh!! And it was that realization that made me start
watching again, and I'm really glad I did.

Crissy,
this one's for you: Your first book was about the CW show Gossip Girl (Spotted), and I was there when you were
pondering your next book project and landed on TVD, and you've done a
book for every season since it started. Tell me how you first met Vee and when
you knew you were destined to pull her in for the fourth book in the
series.

Crissy:
Well, Vee is a gift from the Internet Gods. Back when I was working on the
first Love You to Death book, there was a fansite that Knew All Things — Vampire-Diaries.net — run by two
mysterious characters, Red and Vee. I reached out to them, asking for an
interview for the book. From there, we became Twitter pals, then I started
writing for the site, so we had legitimate reasons to email each other weekly.
At some point in the midst of all that, I was like, I want this Vee person to
be my real-life friend because she is awesome. Red and Vee had edited the
SmartPop book on TVD (A
Visitor's Guide to Mystic Falls), so I knew she could write, and for book
3, I asked her to contribute a short piece on the introduction of the character
Meredith. I always want to know what she thinks about the episodes, and
I know I'm not alone in the TVD
Family on that front. So I bullied her into cowriting the fourth book with me.
(Which executive producer Julie Plec called a "genius move." Julie is
among those in the TVD fam who want
to hear Vee's insight on the series.) And, fingers crossed, we'll be back
together writing the fifth soon...

Nikki: This question is for both of
you: I find the experience of working with someone through the internet to be
pretty easy, and I would think today more people use that method of working
together than actually working face-to-face with someone, yet people still ask
me how I'm able to write with other people when I'm not sitting directly across
from them. How did the two of you split up the book to work on it, and what was
the process like?

Crissy: We relied really heavily on
Scrivener and Dropbox! It would basically have been impossible to write this
book without file-sharing and the wonders of Scriv. Vee's in Arizona and I'm in
Toronto, so we Skyped a lot, divvied up the sections of the episode guide and
the sidebar material (Vee is a history and mythology whiz, so she took the
reins there, for example), and hid shirtless photos of David Alpay in our file
for each other to find. (For science.) It was really smooth and easy — from my
perspective at least! — and Vee was always ahead of me, so she made me type
faster and (almost) meet my deadlines.

Vee: Yes, huzzah for Scrivener and
Dropbox! I can't imagine co-writing any other way. I loved opening the file and
seeing funny notes and photos from Crissy and being able to easily move things
around, insert footnotes so we could hash things out right there within the
file, and then be able to reference those notes later. My brain melts when I
imagine us using any other method. And because we were feeling things out as we
went, I believe the next time around will be even easier.

Nikki: For anyone who hasn't yet read Love
You to Death, this is an analytical and fantastic episode-by-episode guide
with a lot of sidebars, extra information, feature chapters,
bios... basically it sits with you while you rewatch the season, and tells you
everything you missed in the episode and more. But let's get to the part that
made me squee with excitement when I saw it: creator Julie Plec wrote the
foreword, and it's amazing! She refers to the previous books as
"legendary" and gives a huge bow to you for toiling away on this
series as she toils away on hers, referring to the season 4 book as "an
entertaining, exhaustive bible of the character arcs, plot lines, mythology,
and the behind-the-scenes happenings of a TV series made by people who are
crazy in love with their work. Or just crazy. Hard to say." So... tell me
how you both met Julie Plec in the first place, and on a scale of one to EPIC,
what was your reaction when you got the foreword from her?

Vee: I first "met" Julie
during pilot pre-production, through the wonders of social media. But I met her
(and Kevin Williamson, Ian Somerhalder, Paul Wesley, and Nina Dobrev) in person
at Comic-Con in 2009, when TVD was there for the first time. I don't think I
can overstate how supportive and open and encouraging she and Kevin were in the
early days of the show — and even since! But their enthusiasm and respect for Vampire-Diaries.net as a site and us
as longtime fans has always been second to none. And that respect is entirely
mutual. As contentious as the discussion and passion around the show can be,
this fandom lucked out in a big, big way having Julie Plec captain this entire
endeavor. Take away all of her responsibilities, she's a fan at heart, and that
passion is infectious.

The
foreword made me cry. There's a lot of history there, but what I appreciated
most was her recognition that we love celebrating the unsung heroes of the
production and are genuinely fascinated by the process of getting this show on
television every week. We learned so much in writing this book, yet there's
still so much to learn!

Crissy: I also "met" Julie
through social media and then met her in person for the first time at
Comic-Con, between seasons 2 and 3. My favorite moment from that experience was
when the TVD signing was about to
start in the WB booth and Eliza Dushku came up to say hi to the cast and Julie.
Julie grabbed her name sign, wrote "Faith!!!" on the back, and held
it up to Vee and me to make sure we saw her; Julie was totally fangirling over
the presence of a Slayer. She gets it.

The
foreword 100% made me cry too. It cannot be overstated how freakin' busy she is
(running three TV series will do that) and yet she's been so generous with her
time, with her answers to our endless questions, and by writing that foreword.
It means the world to us to get that kind of recognition from her. Epic is the
exact right word for it.

Nikki: We're only a few episodes into
season 5 of TVD right now, so it's hard to say if you like the
direction of the season so far, but what do you think of The Originals?
Were you happy when the announcement was made (I mean... two shows!!) or upset
(the Originals are leaving TVD?!) Judging from the handful of episodes
so far, how has it lived up to expectations?

Crissy: When The Originals spinoff was announced, I was among those cheering. As
much as Klaus, Rebekah, and Elijah have been a massive part of the past few
seasons of The Vampire Diaries, the
characters and their near limitless backstory felt so ripe for their own
series. The backdoor pilot (save for a few clunky moments) was awesome and had
quite the controversial twist, so my hopes were high. The first couple episodes
suffered from Exposition Addiction — like, they all but explained what a
vampire is — but the latest episode, "Girl in New Orleans," just
knocked it out of the park. I now officially care about all the characters,
they each have interesting stuff going on, and it's all a bit intertwining
supernatural fustercluck. And of course, any show with any amount of Elijah
Mikaelson is A-OK in my books.

Vee: I was flat-out ecstatic about The
Originals and, yes, there was a bit of worry losing such a vital dynamic
from The Vampire Diaries. But I think it was obvious from as early as TVD Season 3 that the Original story was
so much bigger than a subplot; a spin-off made complete sense and, as we are
now learning, it reinvigorated The Vampire Diaries, putting the focus on
characters who have often been sidelined. More importantly, giving Joseph
Morgan, Claire Holt, and Daniel Gillies their own show validated how
outstanding they have been on TVD. While The Originals is still in its
growing stages, its latest episode lived up to the expectations I've had for
this show since it was announced. I couldn't be more pleased with how quickly
its findings its voice and footing.

Nikki: Am I correct in thinking you
have both been to "Mystic Falls"? Tell us about the spot where they
film.

Crissy: "Mystic Falls" is a
lovely town called Covington, Georgia (and a whole bunch of sets in a nearby
studio) just outside of Atlanta. I went there a few years back for a convention
and it was there that I first met the lovely Ms Vee. The town square looks just
as it does on your TV, and admittedly I got a little verklempt when I saw the
clock tower in real life. (Yes, I am lame.) There's a locations tour — Mystic
Falls Tours — that we went on and it was very cool to see all the spots and
these grand old plantation houses used in the flashbacks to the Civil War era.
Fun fact: the tour company now has a storefront on the town square, which means
you can buy the Love You to Death series in Mystic Falls. Which I
love, obviously.

Vee: Covington's a small town with
very distinctive features, so I see why it's the filming hub it is, and it was
charming to recognize so much from watching the show. I was especially
impressed with the "Lockwood Mansion," with the lake out back, the
aggressive Steve the Swan, and the owners of the house were just lovely. I
really enjoyed our time there.

Nikki: Thanks so much for this, ladies!
One final question: Will you guys be doing a S5 book together and will it
include The Originals?

Crissy: Happily we have just been
offered a contract for Love You to Death
Season 5! So you have the totally exclusive scoop on that news, Nikki.
We're talking about The Originals and
waiting to see how the series develops, but we would love — and Vee would love
especially — to have the opportunity to dive as deeply into that world as we've
been able to for TVD.

Vee: Crissy and are indeed hard at
work tracking down our doppelgangers so we can realize our LYTD5/The Originals companion dreams. Very much hoping The Originals is picked up for a back
nine so we can start talking about that, but I am equally excited to get going
on a TVD Season 5 guide because,
three episodes in, it's already bananas. Plus, I'm just really proud of how LYTD4 came out, and love working with
Crissy, and I think we can up the ante for the next book.

1 comment:

Anonymous
said...

I love the love you to death series! So much stuff is going on in Ted that these books really help to figure everything out! I just finished book 4 yesterday ( in like two days) and again it is amazing stuff! Like i told crissy on Twitter. Glad to read that book 5 Will come ( can hardly wait!) and i really hope they can make a book about the originals too cause the spin off is a hit! More mature, more dark, more sexy. JoMo and Co. can really show of there talents now and i and others around the world just cant get enough! So to all of you ladies, THANK YOU for all the hard work you put in to the books and keep writing! If any of you watch elementary and want to write a book about that, please do! ( just a hint). A lot of love from Belgium! Jill

Mostly, I write about television, and with this being the home of the Great Buffy Rewatch of 2011, a lot of that television is Joss Whedon-related (when it's not about Lost). Stick around if you love Game of Thrones, The Walking Dead, Sherlock, Lost, BtVS, Doctor Who, or anything on HBO.

About Me

I've published companion guides to Xena, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Alias, and Lost through ECW Press, and my latest book is "Finding Lost — Season Six: The Unofficial Guide." Currently, I love Revenge, Community, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Game of Thrones, The Walking Dead... actually, pretty much everything on HBO or AMC.

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Welcome to the home of the Great Buffy Rewatch of 2011, where every Tuesday night we convened to watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer from season 1 to the end. I was joined by over 25 guest commentators and Buffy scholars who helped me lead you through the watch, offering non-spoilery discussion for the new watchers as well as spoiler-filled discussions for the rewatchers. The entire Rewatch can be found in the archives here, listed by week and contributor. Go here for the full 2011 schedule, and here to see the list of amazing contributors. And be sure to pick up my book, Bite Me, a complete episode by episode guide to the series!